Cool Websites

I've been seeing a lot of really cool websites and pages lately, and I'm going to start keeping a little bit of a list of them here. (In fact, I love lists, especially categorized and sub-categorized lists, which is, I suppose, why I got bit by the DMOZ bug.)

Cool Site #1 Today - Delocator.net is a searchable database of coffee houses and cafes that are NOT owned by a corporate entity. (i.e. Starbucks). They present a wonderful article about how vital cafes have been to society in terms of stimulating thought and discussion throughout history, and make a compelling case that the massive number of corporate-owned coffee houses are threatening the livelihood of these smaller, individually owned coffee houses. This is truly the web as it was meant to be.

Cool Site #2 - Wikipedia's List of Reference Tables is a tremendous resource and a heck of a lot of fun. I spent a couple of hours yesterday just reading through the various television show and movie lists here. And there's a lot more available here than just pop entertainment--there are lists of all kinds of stuff like measurements and and glossaries and trivia and so on.

Cool Site #3 - Cash Keywords is a blog that is more or less about Adsense type advertising and the earning potential that's available to content publishers online right now. If you want to stay up to date on Adsense's policies and get tips on how to maximize your earnings with Adsense, then this is good reading.

Cool Site #4 - Fantomaster has published a list of search engine blogs. There are over 100 blogs about search engine marketing listed here, as if the dozen or so that I already have bookmarked aren't enough already.

Cool Site #5 - Speaking of search engine marketing blogs, the best search engine optimization blog I know of is run by Aaron Wall. His article today about clever ways to get links is funny, and if you read it closely, it's also full of useful advice. Some of what he's saying is a little bit "between the lines", but if you pay close attention, it's dynamite.

Cool Site #6 - I came across a subscription based service that has over 6 million images available for webmasters and anyone else the other day. It's called Clipart.com. This is a handy and inexpensive resource for just about any webmaster. Again, highly recommended.

Cool Site #7 - Speaking of links, one way to get them is to make articles available to other webmasters through sites like Ezine Articles. I have 7 articles published there now. If you come across any of them, be sure to rank them highly for me.

Cool Site #8 - If you don't like your current Blogger template, take a look at Blogger Templates. There are some truly brilliant designs here, including blog templates that duplicate the look and feel of Yahoo and Google.

Cool Site #9 - I might have mentioned this site before, but in case I haven't, Cockeyed.com is a hell of a lot of fun.

Cool Site #10 - Another fun site is Maddox's obnoxious and hilarious series of rants, the best page in the universe. Probably the funniest website I've ever seen, and also one of the most popular sites on the web, as near as I can tell.

Those 10 sites should keep anyone busy for quite a while. And before I stop writing today, I'd like to leave you with a thought from the Dude. "The Dude abides."

M. Night Shyamalan's The Village

I saw M. Night Shyamalan's The Village tonight. I'd read reviews and heard buzz that the third act of this movie was a "What the f---?" kinda moment, but I didn't think that was the case at all. In fact, I'd figured out the inevitable ending about 40 minutes into the movie. At any rate, I thought the movie was excellent, and my wife enjoyed it too, which is a rare thing, since her idea of a good movie invariably involves Adam Sandler, Rob Schneider, and/or Drew Barrymore. (Just kidding, honey.)

William Hurt's performance was absolutely stellar, as usual. Hurt's been one of my favorite actors since I saw The Accidental Tourist at the theater years and years ago. (The Accidental Tourist is still one of my favorite novels and one of my favorite movies.) I even liked William Hurt in Lost in Space, although I liked Mimi Rogers even more. (Hot!)

Anyway, so now I've seen two M. Night Shyamalan films. Unbreakable with Bruce Willis and Samuel Jackson was the other one, and I loved it too. I still haven't seen The Sixth Sense or Signs. But they're definitely on my list.

Search for M. Night Shyamalan on Google.

Search for M. Night Shyamalan on Yahoo.

Search for M. Night Shyamalan on MSN.

Search for M. Night Shyamalan on Teoma.

A Story About My Daughters

I put my daughters to bed almost every night. It's part of my routine. I'm away from the house all day every day while I'm at work, and I enjoy telling them good night. And they enjoy routine too. And occasionally they say or do something funny.

Maddie and Mary are two and a half now, and Mary's gotten pretty talkative. Mary's been going through a Daddy's girl phase lately, and Maddie has definitely NOT been going through a Daddy's girl phase. So early last week, I put the girls to bed, and I asked Mary for my night-night sugars. (That's a goodnight kiss, if you're not from around here.) So Mary stands at the edge of her bed and gives me my night night sugars.

Then I ask Maddie if she wants night night sugars, and she tells me, loudly, "NO!"

So Mary, defending her dad, starts yelling, "Kiss him, Maddie--kiss him!"

I just snickered and wandered on back out to the living room. It's wonderful seeing my daughters get such a command over the language that they can actually have an argument over whether or not one of them is going to give the old man a good night kiss though.